How to deal with disagreement?

2 Thess 3:13-15

But as for you, brethren, do not grow weary in doing good. And if anyone does not obey our word in this epistle, note that person and do not keep company with him, that he may be ashamed. Yet do not count him as an enemy, but admonish him as a brother.

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There are many times, no matter where we are - company, project groups, church. There will always be some disagreement among the people. An existence of disagreement will produce not good result but opposite to the group, affecting the performance and make the group weak.

How do we deal with this?
3 ways to resolve disagreement:
1) Do not be weary (v13)
You might face brothers or sisters who might not share the same opinion, same faith or same idea with you. God teaches us not to be weary because God is with us, when we do things we are not doing out of our own ability but according to His Spirit. He will bring us through this, try to let the person understand what you are doing and the purpose so that agreement might come.

2) Do not Company with Him (v14)
If things don't work out, it is good to leave the brother or sister alone, by not keeping him/her in the company so that he/she may feel ashamed. Normally when a person is left alone, he will start to evaluate himself on whether he is right or wrong.

3) Do not add an enemy, add a friend (v15)
Despite leaving him alone, yet do not count him as enemy. Not companying with him doesn't mean boycotting him, it is just simply leaving the person for a while to let him think about it, then come and admonish him as a brother. This is what we call brotherly love.

I believe if you follow the guideline, you will not add yourself enemy, you might find yourself a good lifelong friend. As this is what friends are for.

Remember, the place of agreement is the place of power.

Sons of Light and Sons of Day

1 Thessalonians 5:5
You are all sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness.

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We have always known that we are the children of light when we believe in God. Today when I did my devotion and with help of Holy Spirit and sermon by David Oh from CHC KL on 'What On Earth is God Doing'. I was touched by this particular verse.

Many of us when we read about 1 Thessalonians 5, we will always see a familiar passage about the coming back of Chirst like a thief, which I always thought so too, until I know that we are the children of light.

Jesus said "I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness." (John 12:46)

So as long as we believe in God, we are the children of light and we will not stay in the darkness. Right, with this, let us look at the following familiar verse.

1 Thess 5:2-11
2 For you yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so comes as a thief in the night. 3 For when they say, “Peace and safety!” then sudden destruction comes upon them, as labor pains upon a pregnant woman. And they shall not escape. 4 But you, brethren, are not in darkness, so that this Day should overtake you as a thief. 5 You are all sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness. 6 Therefore let us not sleep, as others do, but let us watch and be sober. 7 For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk are drunk at night. 8 But let us who are of the day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet the hope of salvation. 9 For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, 10 who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him.
11 Therefore comfort each other and edify one another, just as you also are doing.

From here, we could see that, the Lord come as a thief for those who are in the darkness! But for us, who are in light, we will be aware and we will be prepared for his coming. Let us all stay awake and do the works of God in the end-time era. If God put us in this generation, there must be a purpose for that.

Let us do the will of God and be the salt and the light of the world!

Redeeming the Time

Colossians 4:5

Walk in wisdom towards those who are outside, redeeming the time.

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I have encountered similar verse 2 books before in the book of Ephesians. Paul said the similar advise to two different places.

Ephesians 5:16

Redeeming the time, because the days are evil.

What did Paul really mean by redeeming the time? So I checked back to the lexicon of these two verse and I found something interesting.

In Hebrew, there are two types of 'time':
1) Kronos - which became 'chrono-' in English, means the normal time, of uncertain derivation; a space of time
2) Kairos - a special appointed moment, an opportunity

In both of these verses, the time here refer to "Kairos" time, which means, redeeming the opportunity.
Paul here told us the reason and the way to seize an opportunity:

1) The days are evil (Eph 5:16)
The devil will always seek to destroy believer from redeeming those kairos moments to hinder the work of God. As a result, we must know how to identify the kairos moment and do not afford to miss it.

2) Walk in wisdom towards those who are outside (Col 4:5)
God doesn't only give the problem and reason, He also provide us a solution. Thank God! To redeem the kairos moment, we have to walk in wisdom towards others. The word we say should be seasoned with salt, should speak with grace and not hurting others. Reply others just like how Jesus did and live your life as testimony and with wisdom.

How do we gain the heart of wisdom?

Psalms 90:12

So teach us to number our days, That we may gain a heart of wisdom.

Dwell in the Word

Colossians 3:16

Let the word of Christ (logos) dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.

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Word of God is very important in our lives, it is the only weapon that God gave us with attacking power while all the others are of defensive power (Eph 6:14-17, Sword of Spirit, which is the Word of God). Hence, if we dwell in the Word, we could equip ourselves with full armor of God, with both defensive and offensive power to fight against the devil.

Using all wisdom, not only let the world dwelling in us, but RICHLY. Here Paul told the Colossians some methods to let Word of God dwell richly in us:

1) Psalms and Hymns
When you praise and worship God, it will open up your heart to accept the presence of God. You will be open to the communication with God and starts to learn His Word, not only the logos, but the rhema word. Very often I always encounter people saying that God has healed them when praise song was sung, worship song was played. Truly the power and the word of God do play a part.

2) Spiritual Songs
When you open up and sing spiritual songs, speaking in tongues. The word of God will come upon your heart and true enough that I have also heard people said they saw vision of God and heard the Word of God during Spiritual worship.

3) Grace (Thanksgiving)
Only with heart of thanksgiving the power of God can open up without hindrance. It is beginning of the imparting of the Word of God.

4) Teaching and Admonishing one another
When you teach other, you will be taught back and this process happens to and fro. By this you could learn more about the Word of God.

Just as Paul said, by all wisdom, keep the word of God richly in our heart.

Be Rooted

Colossians 2:6-7

As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving.

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Acceptance of Jesus Christ as personal saviour is always a wonderful thing I have ever seen in my life. When people starts to accept Jesus, I see their lives started to change, stronger and stronger, brighter and brighter in attitude. However, there are times too I saw many friends back-slidden, lose their faith in God and busy with their personal affairs.

One of the reason which gives these kind of action would be the lack of rooting and building up of personal life in Jesus Christ. Be rooted is a very powerful and yet difficult action. You can only suck up the nutrients if you are rooted on the ground. You can only get the revelation from the vine tree only if the branch is attached to it. Growth can only happen when you get rooted. Therefore, it is vital for one to be rooted and be built up in Chirst. In order to be rooted, one needs:

1) Faith
To have faith in God, trust that He will lead us to place from better to best. Trust that He will lead us into our own destiny. Trust that He is faithful, always be with us, the conqueror and the counselor. With this faith, we could be secure that even if situations around us looks bad and unfair, like Paul, you will still be confident and continue believing in Him.

2) Perseverance
Especially in times of crisis, perseverance is the one who keeps us praying, keep us praising Him, keep us strong and courageous.

3) Heart of Thanksgiving
With thanksgiving, the power of God will be unleashed in us and the true growth will come forth. The process of growth is difficult and hard, but it is always wonderful after the process. With the offer of thanksgiving, God can perform his might works on our lives and he will make the poor be rich, weak be strong.
Indeed, let the poor say 'I am rich', and let the weak say 'I am strong'.

Many Christians would think that after accepting Jesus Christ, it is the end of the journey. Instead, it is just the beginning of the journey.

Be rooted in Christ.